Go Bold with Color For a 17th-century-French-style mansion in Houston, interior designer Miles Redd created a powerful entrance hall that blends contemporary art and traditional architecture and furnishings into a stylish mash-up. Taxicab-yellow paint serves as the brilliant backdrop for an Eric Peters painting, a plaster chandelier by Stephen Antonson, a button-tufted bench by John Rosselli & Assoc., and a blue-and-white ceramic jar mounted on a pedestal; the metal balustrade stands out like lace.

Interior designer Bruce Shostak and his partner, Craig Fitt, decorated the entrance hall of their circa-1817 house in Claverack, New York, in a lively and period-perfect Federal style. The front door opens to walls painted a vibrant apple-green, mismatched striped runners by Woodard & Greenstein, and tiger-maple antiques that match the original banister.

At Obercreek, the Hudson River Valley farm of investor Alex Reese and his wife, architect Alison Spear, the stone-floored entrance hall is lined with family portraits, hung frame to frame on the pale gray walls. Heirloom Windsor chairs flank the front door, and the 19th-century settees are upholstered in a flame stitch by Scalamandré.

In a stylish Hamptons home devised by Deborah Berke and decorated by Thomas O’Brien, the latter’s pendant lights from Aero join an Alexandre Noll sculpture (far end) and a Donald Baechler painting (right) in the entrance hall; an Alexander Calder lithograph is mounted at the bottom of the staircase.

In photographer Steven Klein’s entrance hall in Bridgehampton, New York, a Klein image of Brad Pitt pops against the space’s black, white, and brown palette. Horizontal boards amplify the room’s length, the peaked ceiling lends height and drama, and a series of square shapes—the windows, the front door’s panes of glass, and the paneled interior door—provide a stately rhythm.

Circa-1930 FontanaArte lanterns from Bernd Goeckler Antiques join a framed work by Robert Longo and a floor sculpture by Richard Serra in the entrance hall of a New York apartment renovated by designer Nicholas Kilner.

The 13th-century entrance hall in this Irish castle was remodeled in the 1830s after a fire; the 17th-century Brussels tapestries came into the family in 1935.

The travertine-tiled entrance gallery of Donny Deutsch's Manhattan townhouse is anchored by bespoke Ingrao Inc. sofas, both upholstered in a Perennials bouclé.

A lamp by Schoolhouse Electric & Supply Co. and a glass sculpture by John Hogan for The Future Perfect top a vintage Maison Raphael console in the entry of Ricky Martin's Beverly Hills home. The painting is by Corydon Cowansage.

A deep-red Anish Kapoor sculpture greets visitors in the entrance hall of a Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, housedesigned by Charles Zana for a couple with a blue-chip contemporary-art collection. The text painting is by Richard Prince, and the console is by Eric Schmitt; a dramatic glass-bead sculpture by Jean-Michel Othoniel dangles from 30 feet above.